Bohemian Farmgirl in the Big City: Morningside Heights Farmer's Market

Sundays and Thursdays are farmer's market day in Morningside Heights, and I think if she had any concept of time, even my baby would look forward to it.  I'm not even sure she notices the coincidence that after we make our biweekly trip, she enjoys her meals more.  Last Sunday we bought an 8oz container of chevre from Ardith Mae Farm and she and I devoured it before my husband even knew he was missing out.  We ate it on everything from honeycrisp apples to muffins from Meredith's bakery in Kingston.  When we lived in Ulster county, we would actually shop at the Kingston Farmer's Market.  So Sundays and Thursdays also become a little swig of tonic for my homesick Barnheart.  As I type, I am eating a burger (started eating them again for health reasons...) made from organic beef from Sawkill Farms in Red Hook, where we used to live.  I appreciate that even though these farms are no longer local for me, the farmers travel to the city a couple times a week and I can purchase their goods locally.  Every dollar spent is ingested with love and I enjoy the food so much when it is direct from the farmer whose hands planted and harvested it.  I don't think it's my imagination that the food just tastes better than what I get from the organic section at the grocery store either.  When the food spends less time on a truck and on a shelf, the flavor doesn't fade.  And of course, you gotta love that you can get things like purple broccoli (yes!  purple broccoli!) at the farmer's market.  I'm sure that even kids who hate to eat their greens would get a kick out of that. 
And for shoppers who are on a fixed budget or low income, the green markets even accept food stamps. In fact, for every $5 you spend in food stamps, the market will give you an extra $2 for free to be spent on produce.  Bon apetit!